DEPARTMENTS OF GOVERNMENT IN A STATE.
beforehand that they think with him. Thus, either apathy or
a complicated method of reaching the end, instead of a sim-
ple one, would be the consequence. The true opinion is,
that if there is any tolerably accurate dividing line between
those who can make an intelligent choice and those who can-
not, the latter class ought not to have the privilege of voting.
The elections are made in order to find out the most capable
and upright men, the best qualified to make "laws and to
manage public affairs. No man has a right to vote, or else
all ought to have it. If there were such a right, irrespective
of property, character, intelligence, it would be more true to
theory that it should be exercised directly, rather than that
the most important end to be attained—the choice of the
lawgiver or executive officer—should be left to the will of
others.
The election of president of the United States by electors
Electors of presi- and not by popular vote, is not indirect elec-
dent in the United . s r r ._,.._..
states. tion, because the parties for the different candi-
dates have, each of them, their electoral tickets, and no
elector thinks of casting his vote otherwise than as those who
chose him intended. The electors, again, never meet in a
body; they have no joint deliberations which show that
their function is merely ministerial. The plan looked towards
the casting of votes by the people, as citizens of states, and
not as a whole community, which is shown by the two votes
that every state possesses besides those determined by their
relative number of representatives. If, then, the people as a
whole was evenly balanced between two candidates, the
smaller states, it might be, and hence the minority of the
voters, would decide the election. The idea, then, of a major-
ity of the population in the union was not in the minds of the
framers of the constitution when they adopted this plan, nor
yet of a majority of the states, but they seem to have aimed
at a tertium qitid, an election in which the state principle and
'the United States principle should be blended. It is not
improbable, however, that they intended also to make the
electors responsible for their votes, as they gave them * the